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He studied at Heidelberg University, from which he received his doctorate (Dr. phil.) in 1892. In 1891 he had already accepted a post as an assistant in the zoological museum of the Friedrich-Wilhelms-University in Berlin. Initially he occupied himself with preparing anatomical specimens, but from 1893 he also worked in the herpetological department. When its curator, Paul Matschie, took over the mammal collection in 1895, Tornier succeeded him. In 1902, he became professor of zoology at the university, whilst later also accepting the post of head librarian at the museum (1903, assistant director of the museum (1921) and finally director ad interim of the museum (1922–1923).

He retired in October 1923 and died in 1938 in Berlin. He was interred in the Luisenfriedhof-III in Berlin-Charlottenburg.[1]

Perhaps unfairly, Tornier's legacy has mainly been determined by his position in the controversy surrounding the posture of the sauropoddinosaurDiplodocus carnegiei. Following the 1899 discovery of the animal in Wyoming, it had traditionally been depicted and mounted in an elephant-like stance. However, In 1909, Oliver P. Hay imagined two Diplodocus, being reptiles after all, with splayed lizard-like limbs on the banks of a river. Hay argued that Diplodocus had a sprawling, lizard-like gait with widely splayed legs,.[3] Tornier had independently arrived at the same conclusion and forcefully supported Hay's argument,[4] but the hypothesis was contested by W. J. Holland, who maintained that a sprawling Diplodocus would have needed a trench to pull its belly through.[5]

Tornier's acerbic and sometimes sarcastic reply[6] to Holland led to a minor spat, with German authorities (including Kaiser William II himself) coming down on the former's side and even considering re-mounting the Berlin copy of Diplodocus, placed there only a few years before by Holland, in a more 'reptilian' fashion.[7] In the end, however, finds of sauropod footprints in the 1930s put Hay and Tornier's theory to rest.

^Holland, Dr. W. J., "A Review of Some Recent Criticisms of the Restorations of Sauropod Dinosaurs Existing in the Museums of the United States, with Special Reference to that of Diplodocus carnegii in the Carnegie Museum", The American Naturalist, 44:259–283. 1910.